Padres regain sole possession of first

San Diego Padres starting pitcher Cory Luebke throws to the plate against the Colorado Rockies during the second inning of a baseball game in Denver, Monday, Sept. 13, 2010. (AP Photo/Jack Dempsey)
— AP

San Diego Padres starting pitcher Cory Luebke throws to the plate against the Colorado Rockies during the second inning of a baseball game in Denver, Monday, Sept. 13, 2010. (AP Photo/Jack Dempsey)
/ AP

More than once this season, the Padres have picked up a clutch win just when things appeared to be turning against them.

Mat Latos out-pitching Felix Hernandez in Seattle in May; Jon Garland stopping Josh Johnson in Florida in June; turning back the Rockies in the final game of the first half to protect their lead at the All-Star break; Kevin Correia blanking the Dodgers and Chad Billingsley in August; Tim Stauffer’s win over the Giants last Saturday.

Those are just a few.

But all those wins might have been topped by what happened Monday night at Coors Field.

The Padres, who arrived in Denver the losers of 13 of their last 17 games, defeated Colorado 6-4 — not only halting the Rockies’ 10-game winning streak but upping San Diego’s margin over the Giants in the National League West to a half-game with 19 games to play. The Rockies are now 2 1/2 games back.

“We haven’t panicked or gotten down on ourselves,” said reliever Heath Bell, who successfully converted his 28th straight save opportunity as the sixth Padres reliever who held the relentless Rockies scoreless over the final 4 1/3 innings.

“That was a pretty intense game,” said Padres manager Bud Black, whose team nursed a 5-4 lead from the bottom of the fifth until pinch-hitter Oscar Salazar supplied a little breathing room with a pinch-hit homer in the ninth off Rockies reliever Franklin Morales.

Offensively, Miguel Tejada drove in four runs with a two-run homer in the first and a two-run single in the Padres’ three-run fifth. Ryan Ludwick drove in the final run of the inning as the Padres took a 5-0 lead.

But the Rockies stormed back with four runs in the bottom of the fifth on five straight hits off Padres rookie starter Cory Luebke. The big blow was a three-run homer to center by Troy Tulowitzki, who also hit a two-run shot off Luebke in the left-hander’s major league debut at Petco Park on Sept. 3.

When Ernesto Frieri came on to get the final out in the fifth, the Padres were clinging to that one-run lead.

“In this ballpark, a four- to five-run lead is like a one- or two-run lead,” Black said. “You never know how it is going to play out.”

But Monday night, it played out the way other games have played out against the Padres bullpen this season.

Ryan Webb got three ground balls in a perfect sixth. After left-hander Joe Thatcher struck out left-handed-swinging MVP candidate Carlos Gonzalez to open the seventh, Luke Gregerson completed the 1-2-3 inning. A double play helped Mike Adams get out of the eighth.

And Bell got three straight outs, the last a hot grounder by Gonzalez to Tejada, after walking the lead-off batter in the ninth.

“The drama queen is back,” joked Bell about his penchant for putting one runner on an inning.

“This was a big win,” said the closer. “We were frustrated when we were losing. But we felt like we played our game against the Giants, although we didn’t get the results we wanted.

“We regained our confidence and our swagger.”

The Padres also scored more than four runs for the first time in 17 games with their second through fifth hitters — going a combined 9-for-15.